Mobile App Development for Android and iOS

We develop native and cross platform mobile applications for the Android and iOS platforms.

Mobile App Development

Turn your idea into a mobile app with confidence that development is managed by experts in the field.

We understand the intricacies of software development inside-out. That is why we can provide a wide range of services, from discovery
phase and UX research, wire framing, prototyping to building rock solid mobile applications enriched with user-centered visual experiences.

We can develop proof of concept mobile apps for Android and iPhone within a couple of weeks. The complete mobile app can be developed
within a few months depending on the complexity of the project.

Planning on outsourcing your mobile app development project to India, rather outsource to us in South Africa and get the benefits of
local development.

Inception

Every great mobile app begins with an idea.

During the inception stage of mobile application development, you should establish the name for the app and outline the core functionality
of the app. You should be able to answer the one most important question, what does your app do.

There are close to five million apps in the Android and Apple app stores, if your app is a consumer app you should be able to answer
the question, why should a customer download your app, and if they are already similar apps, why should users choose your app instead of
the other apps.

This is a very crucial stage in the app development stage as it establishes the core value proposition for your app.
Getting this part of the project wrong and you have just another app of the million apps in the stores. At the end of this stage you
should be able to describe your idea in one sentence. We will closely work with your or your team and refine your idea into a solid basis for an app

Design

Once we have a solid understanding of the app idea, our next step in the app development process is to solve the User Experience(UX).
We get old fashioned here and use pencil and paper for drawing the sketches of your mobile app. We use mobile best practices for each
mobile platform. The iOS Human Interface Guidelines(HIG) for iOS, and Material Design Guidelines for Android.

Once UX is done we create the UI (User Interface), we map features of the app to screens in the mobile app.
During this stage we incorporate your branding into the mobile app and also design interactive mockups that you can try on your phone.
We will gather feedback and use it to refine the UI. Once the UI is ready the development of your mobile app begins.

Development

Mobile app development for Android and iOS in South Africa.

Based on your requirements, we will either develop a minimum viable product(MVP), a working prototype or the full mobile application.
This is the longest part of the app development process and will take from a few weeks to months based on the size of the project.
Once most of the functionality is built we will begin QA (quality assurance) testing.

We develop native mobile applications for Android and iOS. We use Xamarin with the C# programming language for Cross Platform Development,
Java and Kotlin for Android, and Objective-C and Swift for iOS.

Stabilization

Once development, beta testing and QA are complete we will begin bug fixing iterations. We will iron out the bugs in preparation
for launching the app to production.

The mobile app will go through several testing phases, based on your requirements from the initial project conception.
If you chose the full testing life cycle, the mobile app will go into prototyping, beta and release candidate testing phases.

Deployment

Publish the application to the Google Play and iOS App stores.

We will help you with setting up the necessary accounts on the Google Play and Apple App store.
We will prepare your app for deployment. For Android apps, we will deploy your app to the Google Play Store, and for iOS apps
to the iOS App Store. For enterprise applications we will also help with custom deployment, whether ad-hoc or through enterprise distribution or mobile device management services

Mobile Apps

Some of the apps we have been involved in developing

Hollard Sales App

Tablet android app

Hollard Sales App, is an internal Android tablet app used to sale Hollard Insurance products on the go.
The app is primarily used by field agents. The agents use the app to get you a quote, sale or capture payments on the go.

The Problem

To buy an insurance product from Hollard you normally would have to:

Fill a form on the website

Make a telephone call to the call center

With either of the above, the process is long, and involves a lot of up and down before you are covered.

The Solution

The Hollard Sales app allows the field agents to capture, quote and give you several insurance options in realtime right where you are. We worked closely with the development and business team at Hollard and to offer alternative channel to buy insurance.
At the end of the project, we offered training to the team to maintain and support future development of the app.

Technologies

Here some of the technologies we used:

Xamarin

Google Maps

C#

Praat

Praat is a real-time group chat application for Android. The mobile app was developed to be used for our Android mobile app development course.
The app concept is simple and everyone understands how instant messaging works but at the core the app gives students the knowledge of how Android
apps are put together using the different Android components.

The app demonstrates the use of Activities, Fragments, Intents, Broadcast Receivers, Services, Networking and Rest APIs, Databases and
Persistence with Preferences and SQLite and Content Providers. These are the core components used to build any Android application.
Armed with this knowledge, the students are tasked with creating their own Android projects with the guidance of our instructors.

The Praat Android app also consists of a back-end server application written in NodeJS with a MongoDB database and running on Heroku PaaS platform.
The students are guided on how to deploy the backend server with one of the cloud platform providers. Most modern apps are built this way, they have a
back-end server running a REST API that is exposed to the mobile application. The REST API is either hosted internally or deployed in the cloud.

The Praat Android app also consists of a back-end server application written in NodeJS with a MongoDB database and running on Heroku PaaS platform.
The students are guided on how to deploy the backend server with one of the cloud platform providers. Most modern apps are built this way, they have a
back-end server running a REST API that is exposed to the mobile application. The REST API is either hosted internally or deployed in the cloud.

The source code for the mobile app is freely open source and is available on Github for anyone to use and also contribute back.
The Praat Android app source code is available here.

Flook

A date night app for couples

Flook is a date night app for couples. Flook let couples spend more quality time together by taking the hassle out of finding and scheduling date nights.

Most couples stop spending quality time and doing fun things together once they are married. This is understandable, they have kids,
work pressure and a whole lot of other things to take care of. We wanted to find a way for couples to still spend that quality time and do fun
things together by making it easy for them to do the things they used to enjoy. The app offers activities such as hot air ballooning, wine and dining, city rock climbing, outdoor picnics, movies, romantic getaways and many more.

The app has built-in reminders and notifies both couples on their next date, maps to easily find the location, and in-app purchases so you can
make payment right within the app.

The service providers have an admin web interface to manage their listing on the app. They use it to upload new pictures, update their offering,
monitor their sales and bookings.

Online Taxi

We created the first version of the Online Taxi Android mobile app

Online Taxi is a ride-sharing app for both Android and iOS. We helped Online Taxi create the first version of their Android app
before Uber was available in South Africa. We were also instrumental in developing the back-end and offering development training to
the Online Taxi team.

GoMetro

We created the initial version of the GoMetro South Africa iPhone mobile app.

GoMetro is an app that allows you to find the schedules for the train and buses in South Africa.
Planning your daily commute has never been easier. With schedules seven days a week, it is as simple as checking the app to be sure of what time to leave home. This also means not having to stand on the platform wondering if and when your train will be arriving.
Features include: line updates from Metrorail, journey planner, see stops nearby, email your boss - to send a direct email to your employer, proving if train delays caused you to be late, fare rates and route maps.

Municom

Municom was an Android class project. Our student, Rendani, wanted to create an app to solve service delivery issues. We worked together with our student to deliver the solution

The Municom app was developed to solve service delivery issues. Municom allows residents to send service delivery issues directly to their municipality and keep track on the progress. The app allows transparency in dealing with service delivery issues.

The Municom app was developed to solve service delivery issues. Municom allows residents to send service delivery issues directly to their municipality and keep track on the progress. The app allows transparency in dealing with service delivery issues.